Posted: Sun Sep 03, 2017 7:29 am
by M
Many thanks to those who participated in making nominations for our IBPC submissions this month. Unfortunately, we have only one submission this month. Laura Ring was unable to accept her nomination because she is submitting her poem elsewhere. We are very happy for her and wish her much success in finding this poem a home. And while we received a nomination for one of beachdreamer's poem, we received no acceptance, so we can't send it (we'll be holding it over for next month, though, just in case you'd still like to accept, ad). We do thank our one nominee, Jim Doss, for his acceptance and for allowing us the pleasure of having him represent WPF in the competition.

If any of you stumble over this notice before the end of the day today, and wish to submit your poem, please do. We still have two slots open and would be pleased to send yours. Acceptance will be on a first come, first served basis.

To our entrant, please look over your poem. The poem will be submitted today, September 3rd, as it appears below. If you have any edits or corrections to the poem, please send them to me at mjm@wildpoetryforum.com by this evening. If you come upon this notice late and you have edits, please send me any edits anyway. I will try to have the submission updated before it's sent to the judge.

As a reminder, if there are no or not enough IBPC nominations in any given month from the membership, we choose from the eligible poems (those poets who gave permission) from the prior month. So, if your poem was not selected in any given month, please know that you still might have an opportunity for it to be submitted the following month. Also note that if there are no nominations/acceptances in any given month and no holdovers from the prior month, there will be no IBPC submissions sent from WPF that month.

Congratulations to our entrant and best of luck in the competition!

Love,
M

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September 2017 IBPC Submissions from Wild Poetry Forum


Poem # 1
Title: Giving Thanks
Author: Jim Doss


Often late at night when the moon hangs
like a hive in the highest tree,
I take down the box of sharpest Crayolas
and begin to shape a life on a clear sheet of paper.

The outline of a window emerges,
divided like a heart into four chambers.

In one I draw a man sitting at his desk,
his eyes swirling with the dust of the Milky Way,
his fingers resting against his temple
in the shape of a peace sign,
a hummingbird tattooed on his neck
sipping from the carafe of a honeysuckle flower.
I call this serenity.

In another I sketch
a woman standing by a stove
in a sky-blue dress with clouds passing through.
In her hands a dove rests
soft as pillow to lay her head on,
its breast stained red with the eye of eternity.
Steam rises from a pot of boiling potatoes.
Its weeping coats the panes,
reveals those words of loneliness written there
with the invisible ink of fingers.
I call this survival.

In the third
I trace a hand reaching
for the blushing green skin of an apple
grazed by the wind’s teeth
as it clings to a leafy branch.
But just as the hand starts to close around the fruit,
another reaches out to guide it
toward a face where callus touches softness.
I call this love.
On a good day I might call it singing.

Lastly, I outline
the stick-figures of children,
sexless, all dressed the same
as they hold hands smiling in the sunshine.
Grapes ripen on the vines around them,
little worlds exploding with each mouthful,
as the daisy chain of kids stretches ever smaller
toward the horizon, a wish only half conceived.
I call this eternity.

Then I color the window frame
with winter weather, mist rolling in
from the water, the cracked skin of a birch.

At this hour
the house grows quiet as a river
winged by hands that flutter out to hush the sleeping,
and my name barely remains my name,
my death hardly a nest to lay in
with its comfort of subtraction as the days tick down.

Lord, I ask very little,
but grant me a table to sit at,
hands to fold in prayer
and the strength to say Amen, Amen, Amen
through nights blacker than any color the eye can see.

-END-
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